With evolving of streaming media (e.g., video) technologies such as hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) based adaptive bit-rate (ABR) streaming, users are moving from linear television (TV) content consumption to non-linear, on demand, time-shifted, and place-shifted consumption of content. Example streaming media services may include over-the-top (OTT) delivery of video-on-demand (VOD), subscription VOD (SVOD) services, TV Everywhere (TVE) live-to-VOD services, and cloud digital video recorder (cDVR) services. Streaming media services may use a service provider's own network, a leased network, or a content delivery network (CDN) provider's services to make the content available to a large set of geographically distributed subscribers/users of the service. Streaming media services may tend to cache streams closer to a delivery edge in order to (a) avoid an origin server from getting overloaded, (b) de-congest back-haul networks to improve the end-user quality of experience, and (c) reduce overall cost of delivery.
Further, to handle a diversity of device capabilities, last mile bandwidths, dynamic network conditions, screen resolutions and user preferences, a number of distinct bit streams in an ABR set may tend to be significantly high amounting to a factor of, for instance, 3-4× increase in storage relative to keeping only a highest quality at the highest resolution. In addition, packaging formats, such as HLS (Apple's HTTP live streaming) or MPEG-DASH (ISO's dynamic adaptive streaming over HTTP) profiles, and the cross combinations with content protection schemes that works with end devices may create an additional 2-3× increase in storage requirement if these variants were to be created once and stored for delivery. Also, in case of cDVR, unless a content owner approves, a specific content identified for recording by a given subscriber needs to be kept in a cloud storage in a form that can only be accessible to that subscriber. This is commonly known as “private-copy” mode. In countries with this legal requirement, the storage may need to go in proportion with the number of subscribers who choose to record a program. Further, the subscriber may not even watch the program eventually. Hence, reducing the storage costs may become paramount.